Snatch Read online

  In a phone booth outside a garage, Spike Mullins had been trying to check a number for more than fifteen minutes. First he dialed the local operator, who gave him the number of local information but did not give him his coin back. He had to get change from the garage. The local Information operator gave him the number to dial for Information New York City. The boulevard traffic outside the phone booth was so noisy he yelled at that operator, who hung up on him.

  Now, with the phone booth door closed, Spike was sweating but speaking quietly and hearing fairly clearly.

  “The name is Dubrowski,” Spike said. “Donny Dubrowski.”

  “Would you spell that for me, sir?”

  “Yeah. Sure. Uh. Du-D-U-ah-browski.”

  “B-R-O-W-S-K-I?”

  “Yeah. That’s right. Donald. West Eighty-ninth Street, New York City.”

  “Would that be a new listing, sir?”

  “Naw. Donny’s been free as a bird seven, eight months now.”

  The operator recited a number to him. Spike asked her to repeat. She did so while he held the slip of paper up to the phone booth’s light. They were the same number.

  “Would you try that number for me, operator? It doesn’t answer.”

  “Sir, you may direct dial.”

  Again the phone went dead.

  Standing in the phone booth, glancing over at his rented car, Spike dialed the number three times. He let it ring a dozen times or more each time. Spike could see Toby’s head in the passenger seat of the car, watching the cars go by on the boulevard. Finally, Spike hung up, kicked the phone booth’s door and returned to the car.

  Turning the ignition key, Spike said, “That was your mother, kid. Some delay.”

  In the dark of the passenger seat, silently Toby was looking at Spike.

  “Got to go somewhere else. Wait for her.”

  Racing the engine, Spike sped back onto the boulevard.

  Toby was still looking at him.

  “Broke her ankle,” Spike said. “Hit a grease spot in the kitchen.”

  After hustling Toby in from the swimming pool, Spike had scolded him about talking to strangers. Quickly, they had checked out of the Red Star-Silvermine Motel.

  They had been driving around ever since, stopping at phone booths.

  “Well,” Spike said. “Don’t blame me! Shit! Ain’t my fault your old lady broke her ankle.”

  After driving awhile again in the dark, they passed a sign saying:

  FANTAZYLAND 10

  Neither of them said anything.

  Twenty-Six

  Bernard Silvermine stood in the small ballroom of the Ramada Inn. He was wearing a kilt, a brooch and sporran. In his hand was his second scotch and soda.

  The piper had not yet come to pipe them to dinner tables across the room. The Highland-dressed people were gathered around the cash bar, catching up on the month’s news. For as long as it had existed, twenty-nine years, The Ancient and Honorable Scottish Auxiliary Fusileers—A Charitable Organization had had dinner meetings the second Friday of each month, except June, July, August and September.

  Bernard Silvermine had said hello to the hardware man and his wife, asked the price of new faucets; the dentist and his wife, asked about their daughter at U.C.L.A.; the United Parcel delivery man, asked about his wife, forgetting he was recently divorced—and gotten himself a second scotch.

  Bernard Silvermine’s own wife, sipping her once-a-month gimlet, was standing by the door in a group of everybody’s wives except the U.P. delivery man’s.

  Three men were sitting at the corner of one of the tables. Good. One of them was Ed Noakes. Bernard Silvermine wanted to speak to Ed Noakes.

  He walked over and sat down.

  The three men greeted Bernard Silvermine.

  “How’s the Red Star-Silvermine Motel working out for you, Bernie?”

  “Red Star,” said Ed Noakes. “Communist.”

  “Better than retirement did,” Bernard Silvermine said. “Couldn’t stand retirement. I recognized I was beginnin’ to form opinions about things I knew nothin’ about.”

  “Missus happy?”

  “I think so. Hadn’t realized it, but she’d sort of been forced into retirement when the kids left home. Least now she doesn’t tell me I don’t know what I’m talkin’ about so much. ’Course I don’t have the time to develop great theories about Pakistani politics.”

  Each of the younger men mentioned his retirement plans. One said he was just going to sit in the sun, and the others—especially Bernard Silvermine—assured him he would do that for three weeks at the most before he found himself wanting to do something else.

  “Maybe after thirty years,” the man said, “I’ll start a garden.”

  “What’re you goin’ to do till then?”

  “Study up on it.”

  “Say, Ed,” Bernard Silvermine said. “Something I thought I might mention to you.”

  The other two men didn’t hesitate to listen.

  “Man and boy checked into the motel yesterday. Rented car. No luggage.”

  “Jeez, you runnin’ that kind of a place now, Bernie?” one of the men asked. “No wonder you can afford a new Buick.”

  “The boy was no more’n ten years old. He stayed in the car while the man registered. Didn’t see the boy until this morning. Registered as Jack Jackson and son, Jack Jackson, Junior.”

  The expression on Ed Noakes’s face didn’t change.

  “Thing of it is, I don’t think they were father and son at all. The man was a real dese-dose-and-dem guy, talked in grunts and groans, you know? And frankly he smelled a little ripe. Looked like an exfighter to me, if you know what I mean: face all marked up, glass eye, smashed nose, thick knuckles. Lace burns, the back of his neck. Clothes he was wearing were bought off the rack, and probably outdoors.

  “The kid, on the other hand, was wearing a blue blazer, gray slacks, white shirt, black shoes. His jacket alone probably cost two hundred dollars. And he spoke—his accent was almost English.”

  Ed Noakes finished his drink.

  “This morning the kid said they were waiting for a phone call from his mother. Late this afternoon, way after checkout time, they checked out and left in a hurry. I charged them for an extra night, just to see if the man would give me a story, but he didn’t say a word. Paid cash. And they never did get a phone call.”

  Ed Noakes said, “Did they say where they were goin’?”

  “This morning the kid said they were going to Fantazyland. Waiting for his mother, to go to Fantazyland. When I threw him a lot of noise about Jack Jackson and son, Jack Jackson, the kid just looked at me as if I was crazy.”

  Ed Noakes said, “Anyone for another drink? I do believe I hear the pipes wheezin’ up.”

  “I’ll get ’em.” The real estate man stood up. “Had a big week last week. Sold a five-story building to a guy who wants to knock it down for a parking lot. Scotch all around? Scotch for you, Bernie?”

  “Mine with soda.”

  The truth was Bernard Silvermine didn’t like scotch very much; he also didn’t like soda. Too, he always felt a little silly driving through San Francisco and walking into the Ramada Inn in a kilt, brooch and sporran. But The Ancient and Honorable Scottish Auxiliary Fusileers did good, charitable work. Last year they raised all the funds for a new therapy wing of the children’s hospital.

  And the club was good, too, when you wanted to ask a hardware man informally about the wholesale price of faucets for the motel, or mention something to a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent like Ed Noakes.

  Twenty-Seven

  “I don’t know,” Teddy said. “My mind keeps closing down. It seems to go to sleep without me. With my eyes open. Suddenly, it’s twenty minutes later, a half hour. I forget….”

  In Christina’s usual place across the breakfast table sat Ria Marti.

  Grapefruit halves were before them, but neither was eating. “…I forget things. Last night, for the life of me, I couldn’t remember the nam
e of the head of the Italian legation. I’ve known him fifteen years. Can’t remember whom I’m supposed to see next, or why. Just now I got a necktie out of the closet, went to the mirror and discovered I already had a tie on. Senile….Too young for this stuff…. I just keep seeing Toby’s face.”

  “I think it’s called exhaustion,” Ria said. “Understandable, justified exhaustion.”

  “Does one get over it?” he asked innocently.

  “You need some time off,” she said. “A lot of time off.”

  “Sounds boring.”

  “Time doing something else.”

  “I’d really love to teach for a while now. Put my papers in order, my thoughts….Put my life in order. Some peace and quiet: exciting, stimulating young minds coming to me with urgent questions instead of urgent dispatches. Spend a lot of time with Christina, Toby….”

  “Why don’t you eat your breakfast?” Ria Marti said.

  “I may not be making decisions very well, but it’s still my responsibility. I’ve still got to make ’em.”

  “Yes, Ambassador.”

  Twenty-Eight

  “Are you in the office, Teddy?”

  “Yes. Listen, Christina: maybe some real news.”

  “What?”

  It was Saturday morning and Christina was packed and dressed. Colonel Turnbull had left the bungalow before she woke up. She had made a reservation on the one thirty P.M. flight to New York. She was just about to call Teddy when he called her.

  It was less than forty-eight hours since Christina had discovered Toby was missing. It seemed an eternity: nothing before that continued to exist with any real clarity; she did not believe this period would ever end.

  Packing, she divided this eternity into two periods. At first, in shock, in horror, she had expected all information to come from Teddy. She had waited for him to give her direction. Then she realized there were things she could do, would do—there was a viciousness she could attain to fight this viciousness directed at her child. But she had no fact, no idea, not a scintilla of evidence of any kind to commence with, to direct and guide herself.

  Teddy had been less than candid with her. Toby had not been kidnapped for ransom: “I’m sure he thought he was being kind,” Colonel Turnbull had said.

  Sure, Christina had thought while in the shower washing her hair vigorously. Little woman. Don’t distress her. Save her. Keep her down. Lie to her, or, at least, don’t tell her the whole truth. Believe her capable of nothing, don’t distress/trust her, keep her in the background….

  On the coffee table in front of her was the note she had written:

  “Dear Colonel—Finally slept. This morning I’m still confused, but at least I’m thinking clearer. If I can’t accomplish anything here, at least I can be with Teddy. If I have no way of finding Toby, maybe at least Teddy and I should be together through this terrible thing. You have my appreciation for your honesty.”

  On the telephone, Teddy’s voice had slightly more spirit to it.

  “There was a message on the F.B.I. telex last night. Just one of a million advisories—”

  “I thought we hadn’t involved the F.B.I., Teddy.”

  “Well, ah…I guess it was intercepted by our chaps. I guess, ah…our chaps had a tap on it….”

  There are things Teddy is not willing to tell himself, either—things he’s never been willing to tell himself—like the boss’s secret intelligence group in this country. He’s still not looking straight at that fact, admitting to himself he’s been diplomatically dissembling all these years….

  “May mean nothing, of course,” Teddy continued, “but I’m very hopeful it does mean something. A San Francisco agent reported on the wire last night that a man and a boy checked into a motel called—let’s see, I wrote it down—Red Star-Silvermine Motel. The motel manager got suspicious of them. I guess he didn’t believe they were really father and son. The boy was about Toby’s age and the manager reported he was dressed expensively, blue blazer, gray slacks, spoke well. He thought the man seemed like kind of a tough guy—a gangster. They registered under the names Jack Jackson and son, Jack Jackson. Of more importance than all that, the description of the man fits the description Mrs. Brown gave of the man at the airport here—the man who was supposed to take Toby to the airplane, Willins. Name of Willins. About thirty, heavy shoulders, glass eye. All this may mean nothing—”

  “Was the boy—was Toby all right?”

  Teddy’s voice took on a steadying edge. “Christina, we don’t know that it was Toby.”

  Christina’s heart was pounding.

  “Are they still at the motel?”

  “No. They left hurriedly. Listen to this: the boy told the motel manager they were waiting for a call from his mother—who was going to take him to Fantazyland.”

  “Oh, Teddy.” Christina ran her eyes over her suitcases neatly lined up by the bungalow door. “Teddy, listen carefully, why was Toby’s suitcase left in the men’s room in the airport in New York?”

  There was a silence before Teddy said, “I’m listening.”

  “To convince us Toby is still in the New York area. That, at least, he was taken away from the boarding gates, back through the terminal—”

  “You’re saying it was left as a false clue? That therefore Toby was taken from the airport by plane? Christina, we’ve already checked the airlines, accounted for every kid on every plane all Thursday afternoon and night.”

  “No. There’s one plane you didn’t check. One last question—”

  “Christina, you know how I am about riddles. At the moment, I find them especially nerve-wracking.”

  “Why was Toby’s reservation canceled?”

  Teddy thought a moment. “That’s a good question. To convince us he wasn’t on that plane?”

  “Also, Teddy, maybe to make room for someone who was on that plane….”

  “Toby.”

  “Under another name. Your gnomes didn’t check the plane Toby was scheduled to be on, did they?”

  “No. I don’t think so.”

  “Would you please ask them to do so?”

  “Yes. Of course. I—ah—Where did you get such an idea?”

  “Quickly, Teddy. Ask them to check quickly.”

  “I don’t know…I don’t know that it would help—”

  “It would help give some credence that that boy at the Red Silver Mine Motel—”

  “Red Star-Silvermine. Silvermine, one word.”

  “—was Toby.”

  “Yes,” Teddy said. “Colonel Turnbull doesn’t believe—”

  “Teddy?” Christina pressed the phone closer to her ear. “You knew all along Toby wasn’t kidnapped for ransom, didn’t you?”

  “No,” Teddy said. “I didn’t know it. But I was pretty sure. The Resolution…Turnbull told me this morning that he’s told you the truth about that telephone call…threatening Toby’s life if I submit the Resolution. Christina, you know there are people who would rather go to war than have me introduce that Resolution Monday night. It’s going to cause a complete shift in political alignments—”

  “Thanks, Teddy.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Sorry.”

  “Look, Christina—”

  “I don’t know what I mean.”

  For a long moment, husband and wife listened to each other breathing over long-distance telephone.

  Finally, he said, “I’m sorry. Are you staying out there?”

  She looked at her suitcases. “Yes.”

  “I’ll call you as soon as I hear anything more,” he said.

  “Just tell me the truth, Teddy. Please.”

  Christina placed the telephone receiver in its cradle.

  She looked at her suitcases. She looked at the note she had written. She reached out, took the note from the coffee table, crumpled it in her hand and dropped it in a wastebasket.

  Twenty-Nine

  Ria Marti came into the Ambassador’s office. Immediately he hung up.
/>   “His Majesty’s on the phone,” she said. “He asked Sylvia not to break in on you when he understood you were talking with your wife.”

  “Is he on scrambler?”

  “Yes.”

  Teddy reached for the phone.

  “Mr. Ambassador,” Ria said. “He’s making arrangements to fly to New York.”

  “Oh?”

  “Thought I’d warn you. His being here would make things much more difficult for me. I’d have to explain his sudden arrival.” She opened the palms of her hands in a futile gesture. “It would make everything even more impossible than they are for you.”

  “Yes,” Teddy said.

  “I’m sure he thinks his being here would be a help—”

  Teddy spoke into the phone: “Good morning, Your Majesty.”

  “Teodoro…” The distorted voice was ponderous. “How is Christina?”

  “She’s handling herself well, sir. Under the circumstances.”

  “Colonel Turnbull spoke to me a few moments ago from San Francisco, California. His report is not encouraging.”

  Teddy spoke carefully. “We’re slightly encouraged.”

  “He tells me you received a threatening call which he knows originated in Baltimore, Maryland, that your son’s luggage was found in the airport in New York, that there is a highly unreliable report that your son may have been seen in California.”

  Teddy sighed. His Majesty’s ability to cut to the bone often removed hopeful illusions. “That’s about it.”

  Teddy waved Ria Marti out of the room.

  “The Colonel tells me he doesn’t believe this report of Toby’s being at this motel in California—what is it called, the Red Silvermine?—”

  “Red Star-Silvermine.”

  “—is even worth following up. Worth investigating.”

  “He doesn’t? He said that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then may I ask what the hell is he doing in California?”

  “…Teddy?”

  “Sorry.”

  “I know you’re distraught. Are you all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “You can carry on?”

  “Your Majesty, this Colonel Augustus Turnbull…”